Forest protection saves village

People from the Oum Saom community gather for a meeting. KT/Pav Suy

The story of the Oum Saom forestry community in Kampong Thom province is one that has been told in various forms hundreds of times in Cambodia: local residents locked in a seemingly never-ending battle against a company aiming to cut down their local forest and open plantations.

But contrary to how most of these situations end, the members of the Oum Saom community managed to secure a happy ending for themselves, forcing out the company and receiving all of their land back, allowing them to continue using the natural resources in the area that they have lived in for decades.

This happy ending did not occur without a fight though. Members of Sala Visai village, where Ou Saom forest is located, fought with the company – an acacia and rubber production group owned by prominent tycoon An Marady – for almost a decade after the firm bought a 308-hectare economic land concession in the area in 2004.

“In 2004, the company was about to clear the land to make way for acacia and rubber plantations. They deployed the excavators and bulldozers, but the villagers kept resisting by protesting,” community leader Chhoun Chhorn said.

“Because of our protests, there was an intervention from the district and provincial authority and the company decided to concede this remaining land to the community,” he said.

Mr. Chhorn added that although the land was within the economic land concession the government had granted to the company, the villagers had been living and working in the forest for such a long time that it was granted back to them.

Kampong Thom cantonment forestry administration official Kann Vutha said the land was given to the community in 2013.

“The government officially put the land under community management in 2013,” he said.

He added that there will be an agreement on the structure for more sophisticated preservation and management of the forest.

“In two weeks’ time, we will sign an agreement with the community to lay out the structure and plan to make better protection of the forest, including making an audit of the forest,” he said.

The community did not get the land back on their own though, securing backing and help from the European Union-funded Mlup Baitong Organization.

Now, 95 percent of the 322 families in the village work in agriculture in the area and collect natural products from the forest after years when almost half the village lived on only $1 per day.

Om Sophana, the deputy director of Mlup Baitong, works closely with community members and said forest preservation was benefiting the community as a whole. Their investment in the forest would pay off even more once the government officially created a preservation area.

“We will have the signing of the agreement to get official recognition from the forestry administration to preserve the forest,” he said.

“The villagers can collect non-timber forest products, including honey from bees, vegetables and fruit to sell at the market and make a living. We need to protect the remaining forest. If we don’t, it will all be gone.”

The community will be allowed to remove some trees for sale, but they will be strictly in line with preservation guidelines and renovation rules, Mr. Sophana said.

Mr. Chhorn said that since the land had come under the control of community members, they have seen little to no forestry crime.

“We go in groups of five or six and patrol the area. We do it only during the day because no one comes at night to cut the wood. We rarely catch loggers. When we catch them, we just arrest them and educate them,” he said.

“In serious cases, we call the forestry administration officials to take action.”

EU ambassador to Cambodia George Edgar lauded the project and said the success of the community was evidence that more efforts like this were needed to be made to protect the country’s forests.

“The support to the community forest management project is another example of the EU’s commitment to work with Cambodia in the management of its natural resources,” he said.

“As one of Cambodia’s key development partners, I am delighted to see that project beneficiaries’ lives have improved and that they are now able to enjoy their rights to land and to food.”

Source: http://www.khmertimeskh.com/news/32690/forest-protection-saves-village/